Many products and/or inventions were introduced to help the elderly or disabled, living independently or with minimal supervision, with their daily routines (e.g., personal hygiene, eating, mobility, and taking medications). According to a study by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) conducted in 2008, there are over 1.3 million legally blind persons in the United States. Blindness and irreversible visual impairment cost the federal government more than $4 billion annually. In addition, one in 8 Americans is over the age of 65, and almost half of them (6%) are over the age of 75. According to the US Department of Health and Human Services Administration on Aging, in 2000 there were 10 million Americans over the age of 65 living alone; almost half of them have sensory disability. One common disability among the elderly especially over 75 years of age is the loss of vision either due aging or to other diseases common to the elderly, such as diabetes.
Such people may need help in their daily routines, especially if they were living independently, and one such routine is keeping track of their medications. It is not uncommon for people in the 75+ age group or even younger to be taking a number of medications on a daily basis and need help keeping track of their medications through sensory alarms such as audio, vibrating, and visual alarms. On occasions, the users may not be within perception range of the alarm, so a wireless alarm may also be used to attract their attention.
The information, whether data in digital form or information/instructions in audio form, may have to be entered manually. In some cases, either the doctor or the pharmacist may not be available to spend the extra time to program the instructions.
What is needed is a system that can automatically extract prescription information from medicine bottles, whether printed on the bottles or on labels and enter that information to program various assistive tools related to medication.